Real Time Marketing

Every day we see our customers talking about hot topics in society. Real time marketing is how you get yourself and, ultimately, your product inserted into that conversation.

In doing so you may find a substantial increase to your bottom line!

Real time marketing happens most prominently on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.

Let’s jump right in…

First,Know Your Customer. This is an excellent business practice in general but if you want to successfully conduct real time marketing, it is even more important. An excellent way to do this is to spend a small block of time, say 30 min, looking through your current customer’s interests on social media.

Don’t have customers yet? No problem! Think about your ideal customer who would be interested in your product. What are they talking about right now? What are their concerns? What videos and links are they sharing? A quick google search for “trending now” may help you with this.

Be Relevant. Our goal here is to add value to the conversation, this can be through humor, knowledge or experience. Awkward is not what you are going for here!

You have to find your unique connection to trending topics. The most memorable ones are usually humorous, but often times the most profitable real time marketing campaigns are those that somehow add knowledge or unique insights to the conversation.

Be Timely. This is the most important part. Talk about the things that are trending right now, your customers do not want to discuss what happened last year or even last month, if they did, those things would still be trending.

Practice, Practice, Practice. Like most things the best way to be successful is to practice. Now that you know what real time marketing is, I am sure you will begin to notice examples from major corporations that happen every day on social media.

A great way for you to get started is by coming up with some ideas of your own involving your product and trending topics. If you feel good about what you come up with, put it out there. If you still aren’t sure show it to a friend or co-worker to get some feedback and refine it for the next opportunity.

Mike Reddy is a Chartered Accountant, business coach and advisor helping businesses in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Gold Coast to easily increase their profits and cash flow. He is currently President of the North Sydney Chamber of Commerce, a Regional Councillor for Sydney North East and a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants Sydney leadership team. As well as advising businesses, Mike presents business development seminars and webinars and is regularly contacted by the media to comment on small business matters. You can connect with him on Facebook, Twitter and Google+.